Over the last twenty years, courts have increasingly insulated transactions from avoidance as fraudulent transfers by invoking the so-called “settlement payment” defense codified in section 546(e) of the Bankruptcy Code. The safe harbor has been interpreted in the Second and Third Circuits and elsewhere as precluding debtors, trustees and creditors committees from clawing back otherwise objectionable pre-bankruptcy transfers solely because the money at issue flowed through a bank or other financial institution. Given the ubiquity of financial institutions in leveraged buyouts, dividend recapitalizations, stock buy backs and other transactions, the conventional wisdom was that section 546(e) shielded a wide array of business dealings from scrutiny upon the bankruptcy of one of the transacting parties, particularly in the New York and Delaware courts that administer many of the largest and most complex insolvencies in the country.

Last week, the Supreme Court cast the future applicability of the section 546(e) safe harbor into considerable doubt. In a unanimous decision in Merit Mgmt. Grp., LP v. FTI Consulting, Inc., the Court held that the settlement payment defense does not apply to transfers in which financial institutions serve merely as intermediaries or “conduit”. Since the vast majority of transactions previously covered by the safe harbor involved banks who were merely intermediaries or conduits, the Supreme Court opened the door for the potential avoidance of many transfers that had previously been viewed as otherwise protected under the safe harbor.

Section 546(e) of the Bankruptcy Code, states that, except in the case of actual fraud, a trustee of the bankruptcy estate “may not avoid a transfer that is . . . a transfer by or to (or for the benefit of) a commodity broker, forward contract merchant, stockbroker, financial institution, financial participant, or securities clearing agency in connection with a securities contract . . . .” The majority of courts have interpreted this provision broadly, and found that many public and private company transactions that flow through financial institutions or financial participants or involve financial institutions as third-party lenders implicate the safe harbor because they involve transfers “by or to” a financial institution.

Merit arose from a bankruptcy involving racetrack operator Valley View Downs, LP. Prior to its bankruptcy, Valley purchased equity of an additional racetrack, Bedford Downs, through a $55 million leveraged buyout financed by Credit Suisse. Credit Suisse wired the $55 million to Citizens Bank of Pennsylvania, serving as escrow agent, who also held the Bedford Downs shares until Valley completed the transaction. Once the transaction was completed, Citizens Bank released Bedford Downs’ shares to Valley and the proceeds to Bedford Downs’ shareholders.

FTI, appointed as litigation trustee in the bankruptcy to pursue the Valley estate’s avoidance actions, commenced a fraudulent transfer action in the district court against Merit, a 30% stakeholder in Bedford Downs, to recover Merit’s portion of the proceeds from the transaction (approximately $16.5 million). Merit challenged the avoidance action arguing that the transaction was protected by section 546(e) because the transaction was made “by or to” certain financial institutions, namely Citizens Bank and Credit Suisse. The District Court agreed with Merit, and found that the section 546(e) safe harbor applied. On appeal, the Seventh Circuit reversed, finding that although Credit Suisse and Citizens Bank are financial institutions under the Bankruptcy Code, the safe harbor should not apply where financial institutions act as mere conduits to the ultimate transaction between two parties. The court noted that intended purpose of the safe harbor – which is to “protect the market from systematic risk and allow parties in the securities industry to enter into transactions with greater confidence” – simply was not implicated by an LBO transaction involving private companies. The Seventh Circuit’s decision disagreed with a majority of circuits that have ruled on the issue, most notably the Second and Third Circuits, which found the plain language of section 546(e) includes intermediary/conduit transactions.

Merit appealed, and in a unanimous decision written by Justice Sotomayor, the Supreme Court upheld the Seventh Circuit’s decision. In her opinion, Justice Sotomayor stressed that “the plain meaning of § 546(e) dictates that the only relevant transfer for purposes of the safe harbor is the transfer that the trustee seeks to avoid.” For Merit, that meant the district court should have only looked to the transfer between Valley as purchaser and Merit as seller while disregarding the transfers to (and roles played) by the financial institutions that handled and facilitated those transfers.

The Merit decision now allows trustees to overcome one hurdle (albeit a major one) in attempting to avoid LBO transactions and others that implicate the section 546(e) safe harbor, potentially providing an additional avenue of recovery for general unsecured creditors who have been seeing reduced percentage distributions in many recent cases that include prenegotiated asset sales and restructuring support agreements. The extent to which unsecured creditors may capitalize on this new development going forward will depend on how future courts fill the remaining gaps in the Supreme Court’s analysis of section 546(e) still left after its decision in Merit. That process will begin in earnest in the Tribune Fraudulent Conveyance Litigation, which has essentially been on hold pending Merit’s outcome. Ultimately, as we noted when the Supreme Court first granted certiorari in Merit, it will likely be left to Congress to amend section 546(e) either to comport with the original intent of the provision or to reflect the far broader interpretation upon which transacting parties in the U.S.’s financial centers had come to rely.

The Supreme Court recently agreed to review the applicability of the safe harbor provision in section 546(e) of the Bankruptcy Code after differing interpretations of the statute created a split among the circuit courts. The ultimate outcome on the issue currently before the Supreme Court will undoubtedly impact how parties choose to structure their debt and asset transactions going forward.

Section 546(e) of the Bankruptcy Code states that the debtor “may not avoid a transfer that is . . . a transfer by or to (or for the benefit of) a commodity broker, forward contract merchant, stockbroker, financial institution, financial participant, or securities clearing agency in connection with a securities contract . . . .” In other words, section 546(e) limits a debtor’s avoidance powers with respect to certain types of securities-related transactions. Indeed, legislative history suggests the purpose of the safe harbor was to minimize instabilities in the commodities and securities markets by allowing for more certainty and finality in related transactions.

While certain transactions clearly fall within the safe harbor, like the sale of publicly traded securities by a brokerage firm or other financial institution, courts have been left with the difficult task of determining whether private transactions of securities should also be afforded the protection. Indeed, many private company transactions flow through financial institutions or financial participants or involve financial institutions as third-party lenders for leveraged buyouts and could implicate the safe harbor based on a straightforward reading of the statute. A majority of circuits addressing this issue have adopted the plain-reading, pass-through theory—a broad interpretation of the statute finding that such a transfer was “by or to” a financial institution as set forth by its plain language.

In the case taken up by the high court, FTI Consulting, Inc. v. Merit Mgmt. Grp., LP, the Seventh Circuit rejected the majority view and took a narrow view of section 546(e), finding that the pass‑through of a security through a financial institution and the lending provided by a third‑party did not trigger the safe harbor provision under section 546(e). The case arose from a bankruptcy involving racetrack operator Valley View Downs, LP. Prior to its bankruptcy, Valley purchased equity of an additional racetrack, Bedford Downs, through a $55 million leveraged buyout financed by Credit Suisse. Citizens Bank of Pennsylvania, serving as escrow agent, held the Bedford Downs shares, until Valley completed the transaction.

FTI, appointed as litigation trustee to pursue Valley’s estate’s avoidance actions, commenced a fraudulent transfer action against Merit, a 30% stakeholder in Bedford Downs, to recover Merit’s portion of the proceeds from the equity purchase. Merit argued that the transaction was protected by section 546(e) because the transaction was made “by or to” certain financial institutions, namely Citizens Bank and Credit Suisse.

The District Court agreed with Merit and found that the section 546(e) safe harbor protected the transaction based on a plain language reading of the statute, finding that the transaction was “by or to” a financial institution because the transaction involved the two financial institutions. FTI appealed.

Upon appeal, the Seventh Circuit reversed the decision of the District Court. Finding the language of 546(e) to be ambiguous, the Seventh Circuit reviewed the intended purpose of the safe harbor provision, finding such purpose is to “protect the market from systematic risk and allow parties in the securities industry to enter into transactions with greater confidence—to prevent one large bankruptcy from rippling through the securities industry.” Determining that the transaction at issue of private stock for cash between two entities did not fall under the intended purpose of section 546(e), the Seventh Circuit ruled the safe harbor provision did not apply.

The Seventh Circuit’s interpretation of 546(e) is in line with a divided opinion from the Eleventh Circuit, Munford v. Valuation Research Corp., finding that a similar transaction involving a financial institution as merely a conduit did not trigger a section 546(e) safe harbor protection from clawback. However, the Second, Third, Sixth, Eighth, and Tenth Circuits all disagree, finding both the language of section 546(e) to be unambiguous and that an intermediary financial institution that touches a securities transaction set forth in the statute triggers the safe harbor protections, often citing the dissent in Munford.

Should the Supreme Court overturn the Seventh Circuit and agree with the majority of Circuits on this issue, it would cement the significant barrier created by section 546(e) for a debtor or its successor even to attempt a clawback of any major transaction. Given the Court’s relative speed in taking up the matter and its recent rulings on statutory interpretation, it may be the Court will do just that, leaving it to Congress to amend section 546(e) to provide the protections in line with its intended purpose.

Before a bankruptcy court may confirm a chapter 11 plan, it must determine if any of the persons voting to accept the plan are “insiders,”i.e., individuals or entities with a close relationship to the debtor. Because the Bankruptcy Code’s drafters believed that insider transactions warrant heightened scrutiny the classification of a creditor as an “insider” can have a profound impact on a debtor’s ability to reorganize. One particularly important example is section 1129(a)(10) of the Code, which requires that at least one class of impaired claims (claims that are not paid in full) votes in favor of the plan, not counting the votes of insiders provided that certain other Code requirements are met.

In U.S. Bank N.A. v. The Village at Lakeridge, LLC (In re The Village at Lakeridge, LLC), the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit considered whether a close associate of a board member of the debtor’s owner qualified as an “insider” for plan voting purposes. Because of the unique nature of the debtor’s capital structure, the confirmability of the debtor’s plan and the viability of the debtor’s business as a going concern hung in the balance.

Lakeridge filed for chapter 11 relief on June 16, 2011 with only two creditors: (i) U.S. Bank, which held a $10 million fully secured claim; and (ii) MBP Equity Partners, Lakeridge’s 100% owner, which held an unsecured claim of $2.76 million. Shortly after the case was commenced, MBP decided to sell its claim, and Kathie Bartlett, one of its board members, approached Robert Rabkin, a friend and business associate in matters unrelated to Lakeridge, about purchasing the claim. Rabkin quickly agreed to buy the claim for $5,000, later testifying that he had done so after completing little or no due diligence and with full recognition that his acquisition was a risky investment.

While Bartlett later testified that MBP’s board elected to sell its claim because it believed there were tax advantages in doing so, the claims transfer had a significant additional benefit for Lakeridge’s chances to successfully reorganize. Indeed, because the MBP claim (the only unsecured claim asserted against the debtor) was initially held by an insider, it could not be counted for the purposes of plan voting. As a result, at the outset of the case, no unimpaired class of non-insider claims existed and the debtor was unable to propose a confirmable plan. Subsequent to the transfer, the MBP claim was in the hands of a nominal non-insider, freeing up Lakeridge to propose a restructuring so long as it could comply with the other technical requirements of section 1129 of the Bankruptcy Code.

The transfer of the MBP claim had profound implications for U.S. Bank. At the start of the case, U.S. Bank stood poised to assert its leverage as a secured creditor to force Lakeridge to sell its assets pursuant to section 363 of the Code or otherwise liquidate its business in a manner that guaranteed it payment in full in short order. After the transfer, the bank faced the prospect of Lakeridge proposing a so-called “cram-down” plan that, with Rabkin’s support and over the bank’s objection, forced the bank to accept payment over time, the reinstatement of its liens against the assets of Reorganized Lakeridge, or any other package that the bankruptcy court deemed to be the “indubitable equivalent” of its claim. Faced with the potential of losing control over Lakeridge’s bankruptcy as a result of the sale of the MBP claim to Rabkin, U.S. Bank commenced an action to challenge Rabkin’s designation as a non-insider.

U.S. Bank faced an uphill battle in its attempt to classify Rabkin as an insider. Bankruptcy law recognizes two types of insiders: “statutory” insiders consist primarily of a debtor’s directors, officers, or managers, while “non-statutory” insiders are those parties who have a close relationship with a debtor and who do not negotiate the relevant transaction with the debtor at arm’s length. The bank first argued that Rabkin became a statutory insider when he acquired the claim from MBP. The Ninth Circuit disagreed, distinguishing between the status of a claim and that of a claimant, and finding that Rabkin did not become an insider merely as a result of the type of claim he possessed. The Ninth Circuit similarly concluded that Rabkin’s relationship with Lakeridge was not so close as to confer “non-statutory” insider status upon him, as the record before it indicated that Rabkin (i) had little knowledge of Lakeridge or MBP prior to acquiring the claim and no control over either entity; and (ii) did not know of Lakeridge’s plan of reorganization or that his vote would be required to confirm it. While the court acknowledged the existence of the close relationship between Bartlett and Rabkin, it noted that Rabkin had no relationship with any of the other four members of the MBP board (all of whom agreed to sell the MBP claim to Rabkin) and that Bartlett had no authority to bind MBP without the other members’ support.

Notably, the Ninth Circuit’s decision was not unanimous, as a member of the panel issued a partially concurring and dissenting opinion that agreed with the general proposition that a person does not necessarily become an insider solely by acquiring a claim from an insider so long as the claim was acquired by an independent party, for bona fide reasons and “uninfected with the unique motivations of the insider.” But the dissenting portion of the opinion concluded that the claims purchase was not negotiated at arms-length because:

Rabkin paid only $5,000 for a $2.76 million claim;

MBP did not offer the claim to anyone else;

The purchase was not solicited by Rabkin;

There was no evidence of any negotiation over price; and

After learning that the payment under the plan would be $30,000, he was offered as much as $60,000 from U.S. Bank for the claim and declined the offer.

In light of these facts, the dissent determined that the motivations for MBP and Bartlett to transact with Rabkin were clear: MBP was primarily motivated to place the unsecured claims in the hands of a friendly creditor who could be counted on to vote in favor of the reorganization plan. As to Rabkin, the dissent found his intentions a bit “murkier.” After concluding that Rabkin was clearly not acting as economically rational actor in acquiring the claim (and noting that there was no evidence that he had a history of making blinds bets, “say by helping out Nigerian princes or buying the Brooklyn Bridge”), the dissent surmised that Rabkin was simply doing a favor for a friend with the chance of making some money for himself in the process. As such, the dissent concluded that Rabkin should have been deemed an insider.

As noted by the dissent, the majority opinion in Lakeridge creates a clear path for debtors who want to avoid the limitations of the insider voting restrictions of the Bankruptcy Code. Under the court’s holding, insiders are free to evade the requirements of section 1129(a)(10) by simply transferring their claims for a nominal amount to a friendly but technically unaffiliated third party, who can cast the vote that the insider could not cast themselves. Such a result effectively nullifies section 1129(a)(10) in cases in which a debtor has only a few non-insider creditors. This is precisely what occurred in Lakeridge.

Section 546(e) of the Bankruptcy Code provides a “safe harbor” for certain transfers involving the purchase and sale of securities and protects those transfers from avoidance in bankruptcy proceedings as preferences or constructively fraudulent conveyances. Specifically, section 546(e) insulates transfers that are “settlement payments” used in the securities trade, as well as other transfers made to or from certain parties, including financial institutions, financial participants and stockbrokers, in connection with a securities contract. Section 741(8) of the Bankruptcy Code defines “settlement payment” somewhat circularly, as a “preliminary settlement payment, a partial settlement payment, an interim settlement payment, a settlement payment on account, a final settlement payment or any other similar payment commonly used in the securities trade.”

As we have noted in previous editions of Absolute Priority, courts have increasingly applied the section 546(e) safe harbor to shield virtually all transactions that concern a purported transfer of securities, both public and private, from avoidance. The Second Circuit reinforced the broad scope of the safe harbor in Deutsche Bank Trust Co. Ams. v. Large Private Beneficial Owners (In re Tribune Company Fraudulent Conveyance Litigation), 818 F.3d 98 (2d Cir. Mar. 24, 2016), holding that the safe harbor preempted state fraudulent transfer laws. When state and federal laws conflict, federal law displaces, or preempts, state law, pursuant to the Supremacy Clause of the United States Constitution. Applying the preemption doctrine, the Second Circuit found that permitting state law fraudulent transfer claims would undermine numerous policies codified in federal securities laws, discourage investors from maintaining diversified portfolios, and harm the efficient maintenance of secondary markets for common stocks.

In PAH Litigation Trust v. Water Street Healthcare Partners L.P., the debtor, Physiotherapy Holdings was a leading provider of outpatient physical therapy services that operated 650 clinics in 33 different states. Six years before filing for bankruptcy, Physiotherapy’s common stock was acquired by two private equity funds. By 2009, Physiotherapy’s financial condition had deteriorated and its equity interests were sold to Court Square, which issued $210 million in senior secured notes that Physiotherapy agreed to assume.

Two years after confirmation of Physiotherapy’s prepackaged plan of reorganization, Physiotherapy’s litigation trustee brought an adversary complaint alleging that in order to finance the prepetition sale of Physiotherapy to Court Square, Physiotherapy’s former controlling shareholders orchestrated a scheme to make it appear that Physiotherapy was worth approximately twice its value.

The complaint alleged that the offering memorandum for the senior secured notes fraudulently overstated Physiotherapy’s revenue stream and its overall firm value, leading Court Square to acquire an insolvent company and the noteholders to receive debt instruments worth far less than their face value. The trustee, on behalf of certain noteholders who helped finance the Court Square transaction, sought to recover payments made to Physiotherapy’s former controlling shareholders in exchange for their equity in Physiotherapy under both state and federal fraudulent transfer laws.

The shareholder defendants filed a motion to dismiss the complaint, arguing that the payments were immune from avoidance under the safe harbor as settlement payments to a financial institution in connection with a securities contract. The trustee responded, in part, by arguing that the safe harbor does not apply to creditors asserting fraudulent transfer claims under state law.

Judge Gross agreed with the trustee’s argument that the safe harbor does not preempt claims asserted by a litigation trust under state fraudulent transfer law. In arriving at this conclusion, Judge Gross disagreed with Tribune’s holding that permitting state law fraudulent transfer claims would undermine federal securities laws. Instead, relying upon other bankruptcy court decisions, Judge Gross concluded that the safe harbor does not preempt state law fraudulent transfer claims where only private stock is involved because there is no risk of destabilizing financial markets by increasing systemic risk.

Physiotherapy has significant implications for the viability of the safe harbor exception in the context of privately held companies and chips away at the broad protections of the safe harbor. At the same time, Physiotherapy’s holding was limited to circumstances where (1) the transaction sought to be avoided did not pose a threat of “ripple effects” in the relevant securities markets; (2) the transferees received payment for non-public securities; and (3) the transferees were corporate insiders that allegedly acted in bad faith. In circumstances where those factors are not present, such as a transaction where public securities are involved, the safe harbor may still preempt state law fraudulent transfer claims. However, it is unclear whether Physiotherapy represents meaningful precedent for future cases because Judge Gross’s conclusions appear to have been largely driven by the facts of the case. The shareholder defendants filed a motion for leave to appeal on July 15, 2016, and it is possible that an appellate court will overturn Physiotherapy and follow the Second Circuit’s decision in Tribune.

The Seventh Circuit (which covers Illinois, Indiana, and Wisconsin) appears to have added a new and potentially conflicting standard in analyzing a third-party transferee’s “good faith” defense to a fraudulent transfer claim. The good faith defense protects a third-party transferee from having to return the value it received from a debtor as a part of a fraudulent transaction so long as that third-party transferee entered into the transaction with the debtor in good faith. Continue reading →

For a distressed company running low on capital, an investment from insiders may represent a last best hope for survival. Insiders may be willing to risk throwing good money after bad for a chance to save the company even when any third party would stay safely away. Insiders of a failing company may also have an ulterior motive for making an eleventh hour capital infusion, as they may use their control over a distressed company to enhance their position relative to the company’s other creditors. The line between a good faith rescue and bad faith self-dealing is often a hazy one. Continue reading →

What better time than the holiday season to discuss “gifting” in the context of chapter 11 cases. “Gifting” commonly refers to the situation where a senior creditor pays (or allocates a portion of its collateral for the benefit of) one or more junior claimholders. Gifting is often employed as a tool to resolve the opposition of a junior class of creditors, who are typically out-of-the-money, to the manner in which the bankruptcy case is being administered. For instance, creditors’ committees may seek gifts from senior creditors to guarantee a recovery for general unsecured creditors in cases where a debtor’s administrative solvency or ability to confirm a chapter 11 plan are in doubt.

While gifting may provide flexibility in certain chapter 11 cases, some have argued that the technique runs afoul of the so-called “absolute priority” rule embodied in Section 1129 of the Bankruptcy Code. The absolute priority rule prohibits confirmation of a plan that provides for a distribution of property to junior creditors unless all senior creditors either receive the full value of their claims or consent to alternative treatment under the plan.

The Third Circuit Court of Appeals, whose rulings bind the Delaware bankruptcy courts in which a significant number of large chapter 11 cases are administered, first addressed gifting in 2005 in In re Armstrong World Industries, Inc. In that case, the plan provided that if one class of general unsecured creditors rejected the plan, then another class of general unsecured creditors (asbestos personal injury claimants), would receive, but immediately waive receipt of, certain warrants, which would then be issued to equityholders. While the Third Circuit concluded that such a plan violated the absolute priority rule, it reasoned that the carve out from the secured creditor’s collateral for the benefit of a junior claimant may not offend the absolute priority rule because the property belongs to the secured creditor, not the bankruptcy estate. Delaware bankruptcy courts have relied on Armstrong and other cases to permit gifting outside of a chapter 11 plan. This permits secured lenders and third-party purchasers to provide funds to general unsecured creditors where a recovery may not otherwise have been possible.

More recently, in September 2015, the Third Circuit confirmed that a gift made by a secured lender to junior creditors does not offend the absolute priority rule, at least under certain circumstances. In ICL Holding Company, Inc., the debtors’ senior lenders credit bid approximately 90% of their claims for the purchase of the company. The offer did not include any cash, though funds were escrowed to pay certain chapter 11 professionals. Two parties objected to the sale: (i) the creditors’ committee, which argued that the sale only benefited the secured lenders and would leave the estates administratively insolvent, and (ii) the United States Government, which argued that the sale would result in capital gains taxes of approximately $24 million, giving the United States an administrative claim that would go unpaid while other administrative claims (namely professional fees) would be paid in full. Before the court ruled on the objections, the creditors’ committee struck a deal, withdrawing its objection in exchange for a $3.5 million cash payment from the lenders for the benefit of general unsecured creditors. The debtors did not reach an agreement with the government.

The Bankruptcy and District Courts rejected the government’s arguments, concluding that the funds set aside for general unsecured creditors and chapter 11 professionals were not property of the Debtors’ estates and therefore not subject to the absolute priority rule. In an opinion written by Judge Ambro, a former bankruptcy practitioner, the Third Circuit agreed with the lower courts. Judge Ambro reasoned that because the funds paid by the lenders to general unsecured creditors were not proceeds from the lenders’ liens, never belonged to the debtors, and would never become part of the debtors’ estate even as a pass-through, they were not property of the estates. The Third Circuit also held that the funds set aside to pay professional fees and other wind down costs were similarly not property of the estates, because any unused escrowed funds were to be returned to the lenders, not the estates.

While the ICL Holdings decision authorizes a gift from a senior lender to a junior creditor, the facts present a fairly easy case, and there is dicta in the opinion indicating that gifts effectuated through means unlike those at issue in ICL Holdings may be more problematic. Most notably, Judge Ambro’s opinion explains that a gift effectuated through a carve out of a secured lenders’ collateral for the benefit of a junior class would likely be a gift of property of the estate. Such a gift may still be permissible, but after ICL Holdings, it will be harder for courts in the Third Circuit to conclude that it does not implicate property of the estate.

The Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit recently issued a decision which may give a trump card to fraudulent transfer defendants seeking to use the “good faith” defense under the Bankruptcy Code’s recovery provision. This defense, set forth in section 550(b)(1), provides that a trustee may not recover a voidable transfer from “a transferee that takes for value, including satisfaction or securing of a present or antecedent debt, in good faith, and without knowledge of the voidablity of the transfer avoided[.]” (emphasis added).

The case, In re Equipment Acquisition Resources, Inc., involved former owners of the debtor – which manufactured and refurbished machinery used in the high-technology sector – who received approximately $17 million in transfers from the debtor as a result of a fraudulent scheme. The former owners, the aptly-named Sheldon Player and his wife, Donna Malone, lost $8 million of these funds gambling at the Horseshoe Casino over approximately 2 years.

The casino observed, but did not act on, various suspect activity of the defendants, including Player’s “walking with chips” (leaving a casino with chips rather than cashing them in) and “passing chips” (giving chips to a third party to cash in). The casino ran credit checks on Player and Malone which revealed that they had understated their liabilities on their credit application by over $2 million, but still extended credit to them. In addition, the casino kept one of the debtor’s accounts on file as a “reference account,” and Player and Malone paid some of their gambling debts from a bank account referring to the debtor’s name.

The bankruptcy court-appointed plan administrator sought to recover the transfers made to the casino pursuant to Code section 550 as a subsequent transferee of the fraudulent transfers. In its summary judgment motion, the casino argued that it was insulated from recovery because it acted without knowledge of the fraud of the debtor, and the district court agreed. On appeal, the Seventh Circuit identified the key issues – whether the casino took the transfers “in good faith” and “without knowledge of the voidability of the transfer avoided.”

With respect to whether the casino took the transfers “without knowledge,” the Court looked to its prior decision in Bonded Financial Services, Inc. v. European American Bank, which held that if a reasonable inquiry would not have led to actual knowledge of voidability, a court cannot impute knowledge. Applying this standard, the Court found that unless the casino had some reason to know that it was receiving funds resulting from a fraudulent transfer, it should not be liable. While the trustee pointed to various “red flags” which he claimed should have alerted the casino that it was receiving fraudulent transfers, the Court was unconvinced that any of the signs were sufficient to impose a duty on the casino to investigate the transfers from the debtor to Player and Malone. The Court further noted that even if the casino had investigated, it likely would not have uncovered the fraud.

With respect to whether the casino took the transfers “in good faith,” the Court found that the casino had “no way of knowing the transactions from [the debtor] to Player were voidable, and thus, was not closing its eyes to the creditors’ plight. There is no indication that any alleged lack of diligence was the product of bad faith.”

The decision certainly serves as a hurdle for trustees, creditors’ committees and other plaintiffs seeking to recover fraudulent transfers from subsequent transferees. Plaintiffs invoking section 550 will now need to plead more than the existence of “red flags” to meet the “without knowledge” standard. Given the difficulties many bankruptcy plaintiffs face in pleading fraud with particularity, the heightened pleading standard could prove exceedingly difficult. Equipment Acquisition Resources provides transferees that ignore or otherwise fail to investigate “red flags” before accepting transfers that are ultimately deemed fraudulent with a basis to avoid liability and breathe a sigh of relief.

A recent decision by the Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York may enhance the ability of bankruptcy trustees and creditors committees to challenge allegedly fraudulent transfers that could qualify for protection under the “safe harbor” of section 546(e) of the Bankruptcy Code. Continue reading →

Cooley’s Corporate Restructuring & Bankruptcy Group was selected as co-counsel by the official committee of unsecured creditors in RadioShack’s chapter 11 proceedings, which began on February 5, 2014. Quinn Emanuel will also serve as co-counsel to the Committee. Continue reading →

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